U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit News

As a federal appeals court in Chicago prepares to hear arguments later this month on the question of whether a drug company should bear responsibility for the effects of a generic equivalent medication they did not make or sell, pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline has asked the judges to lend weight to a West Virginia Supreme Court delivered in recent days, which declared using drug warning labels to hold innovators liable for harm caused by a generic copy of their product would “sever the connection between risk and reward,” both raising prices and reducing innovation.

Two recent decisions in two different federal appeals courts regarding who has the right to sue over data breaches reflect a “social shift” in how “we view our data,” according to an attorney specializing in privacy law.

Judges with the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a federal judge’s rejection of arguments that the Federal Housing Finance Agency undercut Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac investors by giving the U.S. Treasury too much authority when it was trying to save the home-lending behemoths.

A federal appeals panel is mulling over the thorny issue of whether Illinois "home rule" municipalities, already empowered to impose a host of labor and employment-related regulations on businesses, should also be allowed to buck the state government and create local right-to-work zones within their boundaries.

A federal appeals court in Chicago has struck down an Indiana state law supporters argued was needed to extend anti-discrimination protections to unborn children, making it illegal for women and practitioners to perform an abortion strictly on the basis of the race, sex or potential disability of a fetus.

Former College of DuPage President Robert L. Breuder can proceed with his wrongful termination and defamation complaint, after a federal appeals court said potentially questionable language within his contract – including a provision requiring a supermajority among the college’s trustees to fire him - did not mean the college’s board was justified in firing him without giving him a hearing to dispute accusations of mismanagement leveled against him.

The thinking behind a Massachusetts ruling that brand-name manufacturers can he held liable for injuries suffered by patients who take generic versions of the drug those manufacturers innovate could have bearing in a case before a federal appeals court in Chicago.

Saying Cook County’s courts clerk shouldn’t be allowed to use court administrative rules to sidestep the public's constitutional rights, the news organization accusing the clerk of delaying access by days to new lawsuits has asked a federal appeals court to reject the clerk’s assertions she has no obligation under the Constitution to provide swift public access to newly filed court documents.

Saying a “trifling loss” is still a loss under state consumer protection laws, a federal appeals panel has reopened the book on a potential class action lawsuit against Barnes & Noble over a 2012 data breach that cost customers some time and money in protecting themselves from potential identity theft, and which the appellate judges took care to note also victimized the chain of big box bookstores.

A federal appeals court found no errors in a lower court’s ruling in a 'sprawling' suit that claimed, among other things, that the village of Park Forest took racially motivated action against the owners of a townhome complex.

Chicago residents could have the right to vote in a school board election. But under Illinois’ state constitution, Chicago residents do not necessarily have the right to a school board election, a state appeals court has ruled.

Concord Community Schools in Indiana would have to do more than put on a play with religious content to "establish" a religion, a federal appeals court judge in Chicago said in his special concurrence to a court decision that recently upheld the public school's annual "Christmas Spectacular."

Whether the Chicago suburb of Lincolnshire can designate itself as a “right-to-work” community may come down to the question of whether, under Illinois’ home rule provisions, home rule communities, like Lincolnshire, can qualify as “the state” under federal labor laws.

The village of Melrose Park was within its rights to fire a firefighter for failing to abide by its residency requirements, a federal appeals court has ruled, dismissing an attempt by the firefighter to claim his termination violated his due process rights.

A federal appeals panel in Chicago has barred an employment discrimination lawsuit brought by a former Hebrew teacher at a Milwaukee Jewish school, saying the teacher held a "ministerial role." The decision could help shed light on which employees of religious organizations should be considered exempt from federal anti-discrimination laws.

A federal appeals court in Chicago has cleared the way for an attorney to collect $87,500 in fees owed by a former client, who the lawyer said refused to pay him after helping him navigate the path to a six-figure settlement in a legal dispute over an allegedly defective hip implant.

The clerk of Cook County’s courts has asserted she has no obligation under the First Amendment to provide the press or public with immediate access to lawsuits publicly filed in court, making the claim as part of her bid to persuade a federal appeals panel to undo a federal judge’s injunction ordering her to create a system to provide swifter access to all electronically filed documents.

Saying to find otherwise would give “fraudsters” the chance to profit from bribery, a federal appeals panel has upheld a lower court’s decision to bar a figure at the center of Chicago’s red light camera bribery scheme from claiming a cut of the settlement paid to City Hall by the city’s former red light camera vendor.